Motivational Moments

Not a 'natural exerciser' by any stretch of the imagination, lacing up the trainers is often as much a battle of the mind as a battle of the legs! See what Sarah decides to do to keep herself on the straight and narrow...

Motivational Moments

I have wittered on rather a lot in recent times re the elusive ‘mojo’ and the infamous PMB ( Post Marathon Blues – pay attention!). Well, to ring in the changes, 3 great things have happened in the last couple of weeks. How can I be anything BUT upbeat about all things running?! Whether you are a seasoned Ultra runner or someone ?struggling with week 2 of C25K, sometimes I think the challenges we face as ‘runners’ (or to be more correct, ‘people who happen to run’ as I’m beginning to realise – whisper it- runners are people too!!) are exactly the same. We’re all looking for ‘The Mojo’ sometimes, we’re all looking to better ourselves, whether it be to win a Gold this summer in London, or to keep up with our kids or to be able to wear a bikini on the beach without fear of being harpooned! We all lose focus and we are all distracted by the real world at times, which has a pesky way of sticking its nose into your running schedule just as things were getting interesting! As you all know, I have been searching for a new focus post Brighton and to be honest, I’m not entirely sure I’ve found it yet. So what happened that is so damn good?

Well firstly, I ran my longest run since the infamous 26.2. It was one of those marvellous Irish days where the rain and wind make for that horizontal precipitation that I have come across nowhere else in the world! I didn’t run particularly fast and I suffered the indignity of getting lost in a new, and particularly large, housing state in a nearby town. I did worry what anyone at home that day must have thought of this sad, drowned rat of a woman running in confused circles at an ever decreasing pace – I was lucky no one arrived with a white coat with nice ties at the back to take me away to a room with nice, soft walls! But regardless of all that, I covered 8 miles that day in 80 minutes and it felt really, really good. Not at the time, obviously, but afterwards I had that feeling of satisfaction and completion that I have really missed (although I really didn’t know I had!)

Well, this post run glow lead to the 2nd good thing. I got home, wrung out my kit (so glam!), hosed myself down, threw some lunch in me and headed straight out the door again. Not to run, let’s not be silly, but to be at the local Olympic Torch Relay event. My kids were there with school and I felt a strange compulsion to be there too. Let’s face it, if it comes this way again I’m unlikely to have much of a view! So I arrived at the local stadium. I have to say, despite the rain and the grey, the atmosphere was great! There were drummers ‘giving it loads’ and stilt walkers doing their impressive stilt-y things (eloquent eh?). School kids were waving their various craft project torches and everyone around me was, well, quite hyped! And then, through the trees we all saw a flickering flame. I felt utterly and bizarrely overwhelmed. This felt like I was seeing a piece of living history right in front of me. I felt the way I had hoped I’d feel but not the way I’d expected to feel! I thought it would be a jaded and somewhat cynical and flat moment, but it really wasn’t. To be entirely honest, the magic moment passed fairly quickly. But it had been there and it was special – and if all that Olympic fever didn’t boost the old mojo-ometer then there really is a problem!

That leaves us with one more great thing. I have never pretended to be anything but shallow so my last great moment of motivation was…the arrival of my Running Bug t-shirt hot off the E-bay presses! Oooh, it is nice! And it got me straight out on the roads, wearing it with pride and hoping that someone would stop me and say ‘Ooh that Running Bug website, I love it. There’s some GREAT bloggers on it you know!’

And so, with all this good stuff surrounding me I’m looking forward again. I’m trying to plan a running event every month for myself and I’m trying to structure my runs a bit more so that I can measure any improvement. (Oh please God, let there be an improvement or all this is a total waste of time!) Watch this space!

Happy running everyone

xx

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